


i'm with you

by benorganasolos



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, F/M, Grief/Mourning, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Ignoring Rey Palpatine, Post-Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Sad with a Happy Ending, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Fix-It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:15:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21925021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/benorganasolos/pseuds/benorganasolos
Summary: Rey grieves.Hope returns.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 9
Kudos: 151





	i'm with you

Her fingertips scraped against the floor of the empty throne room as she frantically sought his warmth, pressing her face against the stone where his body had _just_ been. Panic gripped her as overwhelming grief took root in her chest, causing her limbs to shake and her vision to blur as she collapsed against his still damp clothing. 

_He was mine. His smile was mine. His kiss was mine. Ben Solo was **mine**. _It was all she had wanted— _he_ was all she had wanted _._

Sobs wracked her form as she reached for him in a way only she could, attempting to open their bond, chin wobbling and tears stinging her face when she found it silent, cold and empty where it had previously been burning and bright with power. 

“No, no, _no,”_ her throat was raw and everything hurt. “Come back,” she pleaded, “come _back!_ ” Her eyes searched for him as she felt the ground beneath her shift, the walls around her beginning to crumble and fall. 

Standing up on shaky feet, she gathered his clothing close to her body and fled. 

_____

The numbness that had quickly taken over had been useful in getting her off the hateful planet, propelling her back to the Resistance. It had only been the solidness of Finn and Poe’s embrace that had curtailed the emptiness that threatened to blot out everything else. It wasn’t until she was alone again that the numbness tapered off, the feeling of unbelievable loss overwhelming her. Causing her to sob into her pillow until she had nothing left.

Rey slept without dreaming, Ben’s shirt tucked against her chest. 

_____

It came in waves. The despair. 

It wasn’t just those last moments together, although she thinks those definitely hurt the most—the memory of the look in his eyes, his warm palm on her stomach, the taste of him on her lips— the truth of it was that _any_ moment recalled between them made her chest ache with regret. The notion of what _could_ have been making her lose herself in the raw pain of Ben Solo being lost to her. 

She often found herself thinking back to Takodana, Starkiller base, tracking their story to its very beginning. No matter where her recollections began, they always lead her to the end, when he slipped away from her. 

Rey had thought nothing could overshadow the feeling of her parents leaving her on Jakku, the memory of their ship departing in the bright blue sky—a memory that had haunted her for as long as she could remember. 

She had been wrong, watching Ben disappear from her arms had been worse. So much worse. 

_____

“What happened out there?” It was Rose’s soft murmur she heard outside her door, it had been days since she had been able to move from her bed. Rey knew her friends were worried about her, but she didn’t have the strength to reassure them just yet. She didn’t know when she would. 

Curling in on herself, Rey listened closely to hear the response of whoever Rose was speaking to.

“We don’t know,” it was Finn who answered, his tone equally as grave as it was serious. “We were losing, then we weren’t. I only know that it’s because of her that we didn’t. She saved us all.” 

“So we won, she saved us. Why is she like this?” 

“I can’t help but feel like she lost someone,” Finn responded, a tendril of his force energy reaching out to Rey as he said it. She blocked him out without thinking, covetous of the feeling Ben had left behind. 

“The general?” Rose questioned. 

“I don’t think that’s what this is,” Finn answered solemnly. “When she came back to base, I could feel it through the Force. It was...intense. I could tell she was in shock, but it was almost like she lost part of herself back there. I’ve never felt anything like it. Now I can’t even feel her at all.” 

“If she lost someone important, just give her time,” Rose replied. Rey recalled that she had lost her sister a little over a year ago. 

Not wanting to listen any longer, she closed her eyes, drifting into another dreamless sleep. 

_____

In the end, when she was finally able to leave her quarters, it was Rose she sought out. 

“Does it ever go away?” Rey asked, voice breaking and eyes burning with unshed tears. 

Rose grasped her hand. “No, but it turns into something else. Something you can keep with you, to remember.” Rey nodded, biting the inside of her cheek to keep the grief from overrunning her. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” 

They settled down just outside of base camp, underneath the shade of an enormous tree unique to the planet’s ecosystem. Rey told Rose everything, starting with Jakku and ending with the revelations and events on Exegol. 

“The worst part of it all is that I don’t think he knew,” her voice trailed off as she took a deep breath to compose herself. “I never got a chance to tell him that I loved him. I…” her lip quivered as fresh tears spilled down her face, “I still love him.”

“Oh, Rey,” Rose said, pulling her into her arms as she shed a few tears herself. “He will always be with you. Know that.” 

A soft whine escaped Rey’s throat at her friend’s reassuring words; a flicker of hope flared in her chest at the thought that he may not be lost to her. Gently and wordlessly, she opened their bond for what must have been the thousandth time since leaving Exegol. _Be with me._ _Please. Be with me._

Rey waited a long time. Listening intently. 

Nothing but the wind through the trees, the rhythm of Rose’s breathing, and the stirrings of life that _weren’t his_ on the planet greeted her. 

Rey lost track of how long she spent crying in Rose’s arms. 

_____

Several months passed. The weight of her grief did not lessen, but became an easier burden to bear. A constant companion. Distractions helped, being around people helped. But nothing could make her forget. 

In the moments just after waking, her mind would be blissfully unaware of her grief. Until it hit her like a blaster bolt, the fact that he was no longer a part of her universe. No longer close enough to touch or talk to, no longer _here_. 

Those moments, they were the worst to move past. To remember what it felt like when she had been able to breathe the same air as him, the strain in her arms when their sabers would clash, his back against hers and her hand at his thigh when they came together, triumphant in the Force. The calm and questioning look in his eyes when she had plunged her saber through his stomach, and again when she had healed him and told him she wanted him. Wanted _Ben_. 

_This is all wrong._

_____

Tatooine was where she wound up, burying the sabers they had wielded in an attempt to bury her grief. Finn, Poe, and Rose had all offered to accompany her, but this was something she needed to do on her own. 

BB-8 beeped and teetered at her side as she looked to the horizon and ignited her new saber. The yellow ignited and buzzed, causing memories of a cracked red kyber crystal and outstretched hands to come to mind. It hadn’t stopped hurting, the void he had left. 

Feeling a shift in the energy around her, a lightness, she turned her head, only to see Master Leia, shining and at peace in the Force. Luke appeared behind her. A man she did not know appeared behind them both, looking young and similar to Ben, but distinctly different at the same time. _Anakin_. 

“Hello,” Rey said, turning fully towards them, willing Ben to appear to her, even if she did not want to see him like that. She missed him too much not to wish for it. It would be _something_. 

“We were waiting for you Rey,” Luke explained. “Took you long enough.” 

“Waiting for me?” Her heart started to thump harder in her chest, anticipating what it was they had been waiting for. If there was even a possibility of what she so desperately hoped for.

“We were waiting for you to come here,” Leia answered, gaze hopeful and a comfort to Rey, who felt like either fleeing or passing out. 

“It was too hard,” Rey lamented, frowning and feeling her throat constrict with the weight of her loss. 

“What the Emperor didn’t know,” Anakin said, stepping towards her. “Was that too many sacrifices had already been made.” Rey was struck with recognition, having heard his voice when she had gone to the stars and heard the voices of Jedi who had come before her. “There cannot be balance without two.” 

Her boots kicked up sand when she took a step back from the three beings of light, not able to let herself hope. “Ben messed everything up when he healed you,” Luke said. “Not that I wasn’t proud of him, but we would have brought you back. He was always very impulsive.” 

“And you aren’t?” Anakin quipped back in defense of his grandson. 

“That’s enough,” Leia said, tone admonishing yet fond. “We need to tell her.” 

“Tell me _what?_ ” 

“There is a way for balance to be restored, truly restored,” it was Anakin who spoke. “We just need your help.” 

“Tell me what I need to do,” Rey spoke quickly, eagerly. 

“Call to him, we will do the rest,” Leia said. 

Taking a deep breath, Rey closed her eyes and focused on centering herself, on meditating as she had been taught. 

Shockingly, it was like her pain had built towering walls around her power, around her heart. One by one, she focused on destroying them, relief coursing through her each time she moved beyond what had been causing her to close in on herself all these months, move beyond the pain of losing him, which had trapped her power and full connection with the Force inside. 

Still, she knew it was not enough. 

“Don’t be afraid, Rey. Confronting fear is the destiny of the Jedi,” Luke spoke over the whooshing noises of her power growing to its full potential again. “You moved past this once already, you can do it again!” 

It made sense then, why her powers had been dormant all those years on Jakku. It had been her grief—at her parents leaving, at Ben’s death—that blocked out her ability’s full potential. 

When she opened her eyes, continuing to allow her power to flow through her, she saw that the three Skywalkers had surrounded her and that she was no longer standing on solid ground, but floating. Her body surrounded in a warm glow as _something_ manifested in front of her. 

Terrified, Rey spoke, “be with me. Be with me. Please. Be with me.” _Come back to me, Ben._

Determined, she pushed harder, feeling her power grow to an immeasurable intensity that she had never felt before now. The power to create life, the power to renew, the power to resurrect. It was all flowing through her until it wasn’t anymore, her vision filled with a blinding light until everything went dark. 

_____

Rey awoke abruptly in her bed on the Falcon, head pounding and heart beating out of her chest as images of what must have been a dream assaulted her senses. _Oh, if only._

She allowed herself time to cry, the hopeful feeling her dream had struck within her passing painfully. BB-8 was powered down in the corner of the room, her saber where she must have left it on the bedside console before she had fallen asleep. 

Rey groaned as she noted the stiffness of her muscles, feeling incredibly sore as she rose from her bed, like she had just run Leia’s training course twelve times over. 

Moving to the small kitchen in the hallway on the Falcon, she poured herself some caf, still bleary-eyed and not fully awake yet, 

“You scared me for a minute there kid,” a familiar voice said, causing her to jump and her mug to shatter loudly as it hit the floor. “Easy,” she heard, her eyes searching frantically for the man attached to that voice. 

Then, he was all she saw, standing in front of her, hands running up and down the bare skin of her arms, then holding her in a tight embrace as she struggled to breathe. 

“Ben?” she gasped. 

“It’s me, sweetheart. I’m with you,” He said, kissing her temple, and then her forehead, lips lingering there before he pulled back to look at her.

“You came back,” Rey choked out, hardly able to believe how right this felt, when she had been unable to truly hope before—that she would ever have him look upon her this way again, or feel the warmth of his body against hers—it was a miracle. 

“I’m sorry it took so long,” he said solemnly, eyes all over her face. The look he was giving her achingly familiar, reminding her of those last few moments before he disappeared. 

“I love you,” she said, the urge to tell him overwhelming her. “I love you so—”

Ben kissed her, passionately, not allowing her to finish her sentence, not allowing her to _think_ of anything but the way he felt against her. Lifting her off of her feet and into his arms, she wrapped herself around him, wanting to be as close as possible. 

It was a while before he pulled away, only for her to chase him with her lips, kissing him over and over again. 

“What now?” She asked, when they finally broke apart for air, her body sliding down the length of his as her feet hit the floor. 

“If you’re alright with it, I’d like to stay,” Ben said, squeezing her hips and maneuvering them towards her bedroom.

“If you left again, I would have to kill you myself,” Rey said, her tone light but what she had gone through in these months without him evident in her voice. 

“It wouldn’t be the first time,” he responded, bending to nip at the spot where her shoulder met her neck. “I love you too,” he said, burying his face in her throat and inhaling deeply. 

“I know.” 

—end—

**Author's Note:**

> I listened the fuck outta i'm with you by vance joy while writing this; thank you [katie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/heliocentrics/pseuds/heliocentrics) for beta'ing at the last minute like a champ and crying with me, I love u <3


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